Chuck Sweeny: Brown's win a warning to Obama, both parties

How much should we make of Republican Scott Brown’s 52 percent to 47 percent victory over Democrat Martha Coakley in Tuesday’s special election in Massachusetts, our most liberal state?

Chuck Sweeny

How much should we make of Republican Scott Brown’s 52 percent to 47 percent victory over Democrat Martha Coakley in Tuesday’s special election in Massachusetts, our most liberal state?

Brown, a conservative state senator, ran an upbeat, “everyman” campaign and easily won the seat that the late Ted Kennedy held from 1963 until his death in 2009. His brother, John F. Kennedy, was a senator from 1952 through 1960.

In a swipe at Massachusetts Democrats’ sense of entitlement, Brown reminded moderator David Gergen in a debate with Coakley, the state attorney general, that “It’s not the Kennedys’ seat, it’s not the Democrats’ seat, it’s the people’s seat.”

That became one of two signature lines of the campaign. The other was Coakley’s clueless assertion about revered former Boston Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling, who campaigned for Brown: “He’s probably a Yankees fan.” Schilling’s pitching helped Boston beat the New York Yankees in the 2004 American League Championship series. The Red Sox went on to win the World Series, the first time they had done so since 1918.

Brown reminded voters he’d be the 41st GOP senator, enough to stop Democrats from steamrolling their health care reform bill through the Senate. Republicans believe Brown’s victory means they will retake Congress in the November mid-term elections. Democrats, who will have a 59-41 working majority in the Senate and a 78-seat majority in the House, think they can maintain control of Congress with reduced majorities.

With Brown’s victory, Democrats probably can’t pass their version of health care reform and may have to settle for a much smaller plan or no plan at all.

“I am skeptical of bellwether races, but this is as close as we can get,” said Matt Streb, a professor of political science at Northern Illinois University. “It’s not surprising that Democrats are going to have a rough year in November. The question is how rough, and the indications are that it could be a very bad year for them.”

The American electorate is not ideological, “it’s fickle,” Streb said. In 1994, voters tossed out the Democrats and put Republicans in charge of Congress. In 2006 and 2008, Democrats booted the Republicans. In 2009, Democrats lost key elections for governor in New Jersey and Virginia.

People elected Obama because he said he would change Washington, cut the power of lobbyists and end backroom deals. Health care reform deliberations would be carried live on C-SPAN, Obama promised. But as president, Obama quickly became the personification of the very establishment he once railed against. That was a big, fat target for Brown, the latest anti-establishment candidate.

The Massachusetts vote should be a warning to Obama and both political parties, said Alan Gitelson, political science professor at Loyola University in Chicago.

“After New Jersey and Virginia, we have Massachusetts, a blue state in which Obama received 62 percent of the vote, and the president has not been effective in going to these states and making a difference in the outcome,” Gitelson said.

“Illinois is not exempt in the national trend of anger, which is dismissive of both parties. Brown ran as an independent, formally as a Republican, but he fundamentally divorced himself from a party.”

Democrats suffered a body blow, but voters aren’t falling in love with the Republicans, Gitelson said.

“Polls show generally a disgust with (the) way Washington has been functioning, and that covers both parties. This certainly has the potential to have more impact in November on the Democrats, who benefited from a similar phenomenon in 2006 and 2008.”

Rockford Register Star Senior Editor Chuck Sweeny can be reached at (815) 987-1366 or csweeny@rrstar.com. This column is the opinion of the writer and not of the newspaper.

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